Camelia Pasandaran & Markus Junianto Sihaloho – President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has finally signed a letter dismissing disgraced graft suspect and former Democratic Party treasurer Muhammad Nazaruddin from the House of Representatives.

The move came nearly five months after the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), the national antigraft body, swooped on the Sports Ministry in an explosive bust that uncovered graft at the highest levels of the Indonesian government.

Yudhoyono's spokesman Julian Aldrin Pasha, speaking at the Presidential Palace on Wednesday, said the president had signed the dismissal letter on Tuesday, though the letter needed to be returned to the House to be processed.

Julian said the signing by the president, a patron of the Democratic Party of which Nazaruddin was a former treasurer, had taken time because various checks had to be made in the process.

"There is a screening [process] to check administrative completeness and other things," Julian said. "So it takes time, especially after [Yudhoyono] visited Central Java and West Java. There are other things that have to be done [by the president] that take him away from Jakarta."

The corruption scandal has rocked the Democratic Party and Yudhoyono, who campaigned for the presidency on an antigraft platform.

Meanwhile, Misbakhun, a Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) lawmaker who was sentenced to a year in prison but has since been released, continues to hold office.

Deputy chairman of the House Ethics Council Nudirman Munir said on Wednesday that this was because the PKS was late in filing a dismissal letter.

"He should have been punished immediately after being sent to prison. But Ethics Council bureaucracy has led to the delay. So the consequence is that he still receives his monthly wage, although this is improper," Nudirman said.

Deputy House Speaker Pramono Anung said that the PKS has not requested Misbakhun's dismissal from the House because an appeal has been made to the country's Supreme Court.